Bike Commute Diaries: On Time Arrivals

01May

When I stopped driving every day and started biking more, I started being on time. I can’t fully explain it, but I must underestimate how long it truly takes to drive and how efficient a bike, even an upright city bike, can be.

About the Bike Commute Diaries: In honor of National Bike Month, I’m sharing 31 short, sweet and surprising things I’ve discovered about bike commuting, one for each day in May. Happy National Bike Month!

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4 responses to “Bike Commute Diaries: On Time Arrivals”

Alex

May 2, 2012 at 7:44 am

I started riding to work last year – I don’t ride every day, and I have such a long commute that I don’t ride the whole way either, but I still know what you mean. I drive until I hit the edge of the city (read: reasonable riding distance to work), and then I ride the folding bicycle I keep in my trunk. Most days.
On days when I ride and don’t have to deal with city traffic and parking, I am always on time. On days when I drive and park near the office, it is a toss-up. Sometimes it goes ok, sometimes doesn’t. I don’t know if it’s because I mentally budget an extra 5 minutes for the bike days, or if the heavy traffic/parking factor has something to do with it.

I find that my sub 30 minute bike commute is more consistent time-wise that my car freeway commute. An accident, bad weather or construction would grind the cars to a halt on the freeway. And even when the surface streets congested, I could squeeze past most of it on my bike.

What a nifty idea – I didn’t know about National Bike Month. :)
I find that I’m always a hair late when I commute on the bike. I overestimate how quickly I go, or forget that the real world is not perfect. On short trips, it’s great, but commuting is kinda rough.

Nearly 32,000 Americans die in car crashes annually. 80% of car crashes are PREVENTABLE. If the TOASTER was killing that many people we'd think it was ridiculous. We'd un-plug it and say, let's Fix The Toaster.